Letter: Keep religion out of the classroom (From Lancashire Telegraph)

Dream on. The only way people can be indoctrinated into religion is to get them young whilst at school.

If people were left to make their own decision in later life they wouldn't believe.

Never is the Jesuit maxim more true "Give me a child for for his first seven years and I'll give you someone who is brainwashed for the rest of their lives". Or something like that.

Religion is taught in schools to ensure that our kids understand and respect other's beliefs.
That includes atheism and agnosticism.
Not many children who aren't born into a religiously fanatical family will ever take a theological career path.

You call it a path. ?

There is nothing wrong with teaching about different religions in the classroom. This enables kids to understand the main belief systems of people around the world and comapre them. And such teaching ought to include atheist and humanist belief systems.

Teaching children that one religion is right is indoctrination and shoudl not be allowed in state funded schools. It is like having Labour, Liberal and Tory party schools.

I totally disagree . We are in the main a Christian country and this is what should be taught in schools, Sadly this is often put behind islam for some reason .

switchedon wrote:
I totally disagree . We are in the main a Christian country and this is what should be taught in schools, Sadly this is often put behind islam for some reason .

We are also in Britain, should the curriculum for Geography only include our fair isles ?
You have very insular vision !

For the life of me, I cannot understand why religeon is taught in ANY school, when all it does is inculcate the educated into bigotry.
I went to a CofE school, where we were taught how the Roman Catholic's had used Latin to control education of the masses for centuries until Martin Luther rebelled and translated tracts of the Bible into common vernacular. That was early 16 Century and yet here we are allowing a book that teaches people to lie, cheat and kill into our schools. Anytime that they are challenged upon these words we are told that we are translating it wrong, yet our translators are eminent scholars of thier schools, colleges and universities. It creates in any child a deluded feeling of power over another fellow human being, and that, in of itself, is no way to raise any child.

For my part, I played the religeon card to get my children educated at an RC school/college since it offered the best education for them but neither of them were coerced into following the dogma that they were taught. In fact, if anything, it made them more aware of the differences between the two that still existed.

We should follow the American model and keep religeon out of schools unless they are specifically designated as so. Along with a separation of Church and State in Government, that allows for those that are in holy orders to seek changes to legislation on a level playing field with the rest of us.